File History and restore to another PC

I had the same issue, and there's a way to get File History to see the full range of backup points. I believe this is the solution Glenn Gailey was referring to, but here are the step-by-step instructions for Windows 10:

1. In the Start menu, type "Control Panel" to bring up the old Control Panel app - open it.
2. Click the "System and Security" section.
3. Click the "File History" section.
4. In the File History control panel, on the left-hand column, click "Select drive."
5. Select the drive that had your prior File History backups.
6. Once you have selected the drive, the bottom pane will show your existing backups. You should see the prior backup there (and possibly a backup from today if File History already tried to create a new backup). Select the past backup that you want. A message may pop up informing you that this is a past backup.
7. Once you're back at the File History control panel, on the left-hand column, click "Restore personal files." You should be able to use the File History navigation tool to navigate your prior backup and restore it.

Good luck!

Unfortunately this doesn't always work (though I haven't tried it on the latest Windows 10) - it seemed to require the username and computer name on the new cleanly installed machine to be exactly the same as on the old machine, and even then it always failed for me on Win 8.1.

All that is unnecessary. After reading all previous posts and experimenting I found the follow (in windows 10):

Which brings up the following:

Click on select another back and it will bring up the following:

From there you browse the files you want to restore, restoring individual files, or folders and all in them and everything.

Muzza.au

I have the same problem.

I had to reinstall windows 10, since my computer had stopped working correctly. My external drive, where I keep my windows history, had been connected up until the day before the crash, so I should have most of my files there.

After windows 10 had been reinstalled, I reconnected my external drive, and started up windows history configuration. The list of available drives was shown, containing only my external drive. When I selected it, no old history was shown, and no option to select an old backup was presented. This might have been because I had already started the new history. Another reason may have been that my computer name has been changed in the process (from KROISOS to DESKTOP-6A09HVD) and my user name was changed from BOUDEWIJN to WAIJERS. By now, I changed the computer name back to KROISOS.

Anyway, the path to the configuration directory on my backup device was: E:/FileHistory/Boudewijn/KROISOS/Configuration. The previously backup'ed files are in E:/FileHistory/Boudewijn/KROISOS/Data/C/Users/Boudewijn. Since I had already started backing up the history again, there is now also a directory E:/FileHistory/Boudewijn/KROISOS/Data/C/Users/Waijers, which contains my current file history (empty, but for the directories, since I have no files on my reinstalled pc yet). As noted, the files in Waijers are visible in the windows history backup overview, but alas, the files in Boudewijn are not.

In the catalog directory, all four files (config1.xml, config2.xml, catalog1.edb and catalog2.edb) have been overwritten, since I already started my new history. I have no copy of the original four files.

Is there any way to edit the names of the directories and/or the content of the xml files, in order to be able to have file history see the old file history, and restore it?

The content of the config1.xml file is as follows:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<DataProtectionUserConfig SchemaVersion="1">

  <UserName>Waijers</UserName>

  <FriendlyName>Waijers</FriendlyName>

  <PCName>DESKTOP-6A09HVD</PCName>

  <UserId>7b9e03b0-d31c-4087-8967-0f391d2c687f</UserId>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*2112ab0a-c86a-4ffe-a368-0de96e47012e</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Music</Folder>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive\Muziek</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>Opgeslagen afbeeldingen</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures\Saved Pictures</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*491e922f-5643-4af4-a7eb-4e7a138d8174</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Videos</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>Camera-album</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures\Camera Roll</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*7b0db17d-9cd2-4a93-9733-46cc89022e7c</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Documents</Folder>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive\Documenten</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*a990ae9f-a03b-4e80-94bc-9912d7504104</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures</Folder>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive\Afbeeldingen</Folder>

  </Library>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Searches</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Desktop</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Contacts</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Favorites</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Videos</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Music</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Downloads</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Documents</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Links</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Saved Games</UserFolder>

  <LocalCatalogPath1>C:\Users\Waijers\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\FileHistory\Configuration\Catalog1.edb</LocalCatalogPath1>

  <LocalCatalogPath2>C:\Users\Waijers\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\FileHistory\Configuration\Catalog2.edb</LocalCatalogPath2>

  <StagingArea>

    <StagingAreaPath>C:\Users\Waijers\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\FileHistory\Data</StagingAreaPath>

    <StagingAreaMaximumCapacity>2497566453</StagingAreaMaximumCapacity>

    <StagingAreaWarningThreshold>1873174839</StagingAreaWarningThreshold>

  </StagingArea>

  <AvailabilityPolicies>

    <TargetAbsenceTime>5</TargetAbsenceTime>

    <TimeInUnprotectedState>3</TimeInUnprotectedState>

  </AvailabilityPolicies>

  <RetentionPolicies>

    <RetentionPolicyType>DISABLED</RetentionPolicyType>

    <MinimumRetentionAge>365</MinimumRetentionAge>

  </RetentionPolicies>

  <DPFrequency>3600</DPFrequency>

  <DPStatus>ENABLED</DPStatus>

  <Target>

    <TargetName>Backup drive I</TargetName>

    <TargetUrl>E:&lt;/TargetUrl>

    <TargetVolumePath>\?\Volume{98f03193-0000-0000-0000-100000000000}&lt;/TargetVolumePath>

    <TargetDriveType>FIXED</TargetDriveType>

    <TargetConfigPath1>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Config1.xml</TargetConfigPath1>

    <TargetConfigPath2>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Config2.xml</TargetConfigPath2>

    <TargetCatalogPath1>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Catalog1.edb</TargetCatalogPath1>

    <TargetCatalogPath2>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Catalog2.edb</TargetCatalogPath2>

    <TargetBackupStorePath>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Data</TargetBackupStorePath>

    <TargetWarningThreshold>98</TargetWarningThreshold>

  </Target>

</DataProtectionUserConfig>

The number of files in my old history is over 155,551, and just copying the whole tree to my newly installed computer, followed by deleting the files that have multiple versions, and finally renaming them to their old names would be unfeasible.

Perhaps someone knows of some third party tool that does the trick of searching through these files to sift out the files that have multiple copies (save for the timestamp)?

Or would it help to create a new user account 'Boudewijn' and then starting windows history again, hoping that windows history will then see the correct backup?

Or am I too late anyway, and is the fact that my catalog.edb files have been overwritten reason enough to stop hoping. Whithout these two files, is restoration in any automated way still possible, at all?

Thanks in advance for your advice!